Japan on points: ANA, JAL and the cash that stays

Which bank points reach a Japanese airline at all

Japan is a trip where the bank you hold narrows the options before any chart is opened. On the issuer pages read on October 22, 2026, Amex's transfer page lists ANA Mileage Club at 1,000 to 1,000 in increments of 1,000. Capital One's partner page lists Japan Airlines Mileage Bank among the airlines at a 2:1.5 ratio, which the page spells out as 1,000 Capital One miles becoming 750. Bilt's partner article, updated October 20, 2026, lists Japan Airlines at 1:1 and does not list ANA. Chase's transfer guide names neither airline. Citi's public Strata Premier page names American, JetBlue, Virgin Atlantic, Cathay, EVA Air, Choice and The Leading Hotels of the World "and others", so the transfer screen inside your own account is the only place to confirm whether a Citi route exists. This guide does not assume one.

So the pairing is lopsided. Amex holders have ANA and no JAL. Bilt and Capital One holders have JAL and no ANA. Chase holders have neither, and need a program that sits between them and a Japanese airline, which is the subject of a later section. Everything below is built around that split, because the two airlines price differently enough that the right one depends on cabin, season and which points you are spending.

Timing differs as well. Amex withdraws points immediately but warns that in rare instances a transfer can take longer to appear, and the page prints a rare-case window of 4 days for ANA. Bilt's Transfer Partner Terms say most transfers complete within 20 minutes and its help article says most are immediate, and both allow up to 48 hours. Capital One's page prints no timing at all. Since none of these transfers can be undone, the order in the transfer procedure guide still holds: find the seat first, then move points.

ANA's chart: one-way prices from North America and Hawaii

ANA prices international awards from a zone chart with three seasons. For tickets reserved and issued on or after June 24, 2025, ANA's page says awards start at 6,000 miles one way and 12,000 round trip, and it prints a separate one-way chart. North America is Zone 6 on that chart and includes Los Angeles, San Francisco, Seattle, San Jose, Washington Dulles, New York, Chicago O'Hare, Houston, Vancouver and Mexico City. Honolulu is Zone 5. The table below copies the one-way figures to and from Japan, checked October 22, 2026.

Round trips are simply the two directions added when both fall in the same season and cabin. ANA's round-trip chart for Japan and North America shows 50,000 miles in economy in regular season, which is twice the 25,000 one-way figure, and 105,000 in business, twice 52,500. If the outbound and return are in different cabins, ANA halves the price of each cabin and adds the halves, and if the last city of the outbound and the first city of the return sit in different zones, it halves the price of each zone, so a Tokyo to Honolulu to Los Angeles to Tokyo routing is priced as half of each.

The season bands matter more than the cabin on a long trip. The same economy seat is 20,000 miles in low season, 25,000 in regular and 36,000 in high season, so a departure moved from July 20, 2027 to August 24, 2027 drops the one-way price from 36,000 to 25,000 miles, a difference of 11,000 ANA miles. ANA notes that the periods in its seasonality charts can change, for example for sales promotions, so read the date on the booking screen rather than relying on a calendar copied from any page, including this one.

Which dates count as low, regular and high for ANA

ANA prints a seasonality list for each pair of zones, and the Japan to North America list is the one most US travelers need. It is by departure date, so an outbound and a return can fall in different seasons and be priced separately. The rows below are the windows ANA published for departures from late 2026 through 2027, read on October 22, 2026.

Two details from the list change planning. For 2027, ANA lists everything from March 1 through April 28 as regular season, so the only low-season window of the year is January 6 to February 28, and a spring departure is not discounted. The other detail is the end of December, which ANA lists as high season from December 19 in 2026 and from December 20 in 2027, running to the end of the year.

JAL's chart: a flat base price, and what PLUS does

JAL's international award chart is route-based and does not change by season for economy, premium economy or business. The chart is updated April 16, 2026 on the copy read for this guide, and it prints one-way base prices to and from Japan. For North American cities it lists 27,000 miles in economy, 40,000 in premium economy and 55,000 in business for New York, Boston, Chicago, Dallas, San Francisco, Los Angeles, San Diego, Seattle and Vancouver alike. Honolulu is 20,000, 30,000 and 43,000. First class is the exception, with low, regular and high prices of 110,000, 125,000 and 140,000 miles for Los Angeles and several other North American cities.

The word base is doing work. JAL says the number of miles required varies with the itinerary and with the seats left on the flight, and that when no seat can be booked at the lowest price you can book the same seat with additional miles, a tier it calls Award Ticket PLUS. The chart prints the PLUS maximum for each city, such as 195,000 miles for Los Angeles economy against a 27,000-mile base. It is a ceiling, not a typical price, but it explains why a seat that shows at 27,000 on one date can show far higher on another, and why a search result, not the chart, is the number to plan on. PLUS does not exist for first class.

One caveat on the source. JAL's own site refused automated access on October 22, 2026, so the chart and the surcharge figures below come from Internet Archive copies of JAL's pages captured on August 31 and September 11, 2026, and the JAL page shows its own update date of April 16, 2026. Read them as the figures JAL published at those dates, and look at the live page, which opens normally in a browser, before you transfer.

Put against ANA's chart, the two airlines trade places through the year. The table compares one-way North America prices using each airline's own season, which are not the same dates, so the last column is a rule of thumb rather than a calendar.

The fuel surcharge: the cash that does not go away

Both airlines charge a fuel surcharge on award tickets, and on a Japan trip it is large. ANA's fare-rules page states that the fuel surcharge covers award tickets bought with its Mileage Club miles as well, that it is charged per passenger and per flight, and that the amount in effect on the day of ticketing is the one charged. JAL's page says the same for its Mileage Bank awards, adds that the surcharge is reviewed every two months, and that the full amount is returned if an unused ticket is refunded. For the US, both airlines publish a figure for the whole route from North America to Japan rather than a distance scale.

The table lists the per-direction amounts for tickets purchased in America or, for JAL, for travel originating outside Japan. ANA's page was last updated October 30, 2026 and shows USD 419 for tickets issued November 1 to December 31, up from USD 352 for September and October. JAL's copy, captured September 11, 2026, lists September and October but not November onward, so treat any later JAL figure as unpublished until you see it on the booking screen.

Currency conversion is rarely needed for these two, because the US figures are printed in dollars. If you do need to convert yen taxes and fees, CalculatorVillage has a JPY to USD converter, listed in the sources below; the guide on award taxes and carrier surcharges explains how to tell a government tax from a carrier-imposed charge on the payment screen.

Every other charge on a Japan award, with its source

The fuel surcharge is the largest line, not the only one. The list below is what each source printed for a trip that starts in the United States and returns to it, so each charge that is per departure or per arrival appears once for each direction in the totals that follow. Charges that the sources do not name, such as customs and agriculture inspection fees on the way back into the US, are left to the payment screen rather than guessed.

• ANA insurance surcharge: for tickets issued on or after April 1, 2026 and not bought in Japan, ANA prints the local-currency equivalent of USD 7.80 per passenger, per route segment. The same page lists exclusions for itineraries originating or terminating in Canada, Hong Kong or Mexico.
• JAL insurance surcharge: USD 4 per person for each segment when sold outside Japan, with a note that it is not charged on some routes such as to or from Canada and Hong Kong.
• ANA ticketing service charge: none when the award is issued on ANA's website, and USD 25 per passenger per set of tickets when the purchase location is the United States, as ANA's table lists it.
• FAA international arrival and departure tax: $23.40 per passenger in 2026, which this guide treats as charged on each of the two crossings of a round trip that leaves and re-enters the US.
• TSA September 11 Security Fee: $5.60 per one-way trip that starts at a US airport.
• Japan's international tourist tax: 3,000 yen per departure from Japan since July 1, 2026, up from 1,000 yen, which the Japan National Tourism Organization says is in most cases added to the ticket at purchase.
• Amex's excise tax offset fee: charged only when points go into a US airline program, so it does not arise for ANA or JAL, which is the rule Amex prints for transfers.

An economy round trip priced three ways

What follows is an arithmetic illustration with stated inputs, not live inventory. One adult flies economy round trip between Los Angeles and Tokyo, leaving May 20, 2027 and returning June 5, 2027. Both dates are regular season on ANA's list. The ticket is issued in November 2026, inside ANA's November 1 to December 31 surcharge window. JAL's archived page stops at October, so the JAL lines use the $320 it printed for September and October, the latest JAL figure available; check JAL's payment screen for the November amount. The cash fare for the same dates is assumed to be $1,450. Japan's 3,000 yen tourist tax is converted at an assumed 150 yen to the dollar, about $20.

The cash that stays on an ANA award is two fuel surcharges at $419, $838, plus two insurance surcharges at $7.80, $15.60, plus the FAA tax on two crossings, $46.80, plus the TSA fee, $5.60, plus the Japanese tourist tax, about $20. That is $926.00 in total. On JAL the fuel lines are $320 each, $640, and the insurance lines $4 each, $8, with the same $72.40 of government charges, so $720.40.

The miles come next. ANA's round trip is 50,000 miles, so 50,000 Amex points at 1,000 to 1,000. JAL's base is 27,000 each way, 54,000 in all, which is 54,000 Bilt Points at 1:1 and 72,000 Capital One miles at 2:1.5, because each 2,000 Capital One miles produce 1,500 JAL miles. Cents per bank point is the cash fare minus the cash that stays, divided by the bank points spent.

The same seat when the cash fare is higher or lower

Surcharges do not shrink when the fare drops, so a cheap fare is where Japan awards lose. On the $1,450 assumption, ANA's fuel and insurance charges alone are $853.60, well over half of the cash price, so the award can only save what is left of the fare before the points are counted. If the real fare for your dates is $950, the same Amex route returns (950 minus 926) divided by 50,000, or 0.05 cents per point, and the cash ticket is the better use of the money.

Instead of arguing about a fare, work backwards. The breakeven cash fare for a target is the cash that stays plus the target cents multiplied by the bank points spent. The target is yours to set, and the table does not say any target is right. It shows how far the fare has to rise before each route reaches it.

Business class: the fixed surcharge matters less

Premium cabins change the arithmetic because the cash fare grows while the surcharge stays put. Using the same dates and an assumed business fare of $5,600, ANA's round trip is 105,000 miles, twice the 52,500 regular-season one-way price. JAL's base is 55,000 each way, 110,000 in all. Bilt sends 110,000 Bilt Points at 1:1. Capital One needs 110,000 divided by 0.75, which is 146,667 miles, so a transfer rounds up to 147,000 and delivers 110,250 JAL miles with 250 left over.

ANA comes out ahead here by a hundredth of a cent, 4.45 against 4.44, where JAL via Bilt led clearly in economy, because ANA's regular-season business price of 52,500 sits below JAL's 55,000 and only just outweighs JAL's lower cash line. The Capital One route stays about one-third more expensive in points in any cabin, because the 2:1.5 ratio does not depend on the cabin. In high season the order changes, since ANA's business price is 82,500 each way and JAL's stays at 55,000. The premium cabin playbook covers how to pick the cash base for a seat like this, and the long haul economy playbook covers the economy side of the same Asia question.

If your bank reaches neither airline: the Aeroplan check

Chase holders, and anyone who finds ANA and JAL unreachable from their own currency, can price the same flights through a program in the middle. ANA and Air Canada are both Star Alliance members according to the alliance's members page, and Air Canada's Aeroplan chart prices travel on partners outside its named list at flat rates. Its select partners are United, Emirates, Flydubai, Etihad, Canadian North, Calm Air, Bearskin and PAL, so ANA falls into the all-other-partners row. Chase, Amex, Capital One and Bilt all list Aeroplan. Whether a given ANA flight shows up in Aeroplan search, and at what price, is a question only a live search answers. Carried on past Tokyo to Bangkok or Singapore, the same connection is priced against KrisFlyer, Atmos and Virgin Atlantic in Southeast Asia on points.

The August 2026 chart prints North America to Pacific one-way partner prices by distance flown. The chart does not list cities, so the band comes from your itinerary on the search screen, and the chart does not name Japan in the text extracted for this guide. Aeroplan's policy examples place Hong Kong and Bangkok in the Pacific zone, so the assumption here is that Tokyo prices as Pacific, to be confirmed on screen. For illustration, assume the flown distance falls in the 5,001 to 7,500 miles band, which would make the economy round trip 100,000 Aeroplan points against ANA's own 50,000 miles, and the business round trip 170,000 against 105,000.

Aeroplan adds its own costs. The policy charges a partner booking fee of $39 CAD per ticket when any part of the trip is on an airline other than Air Canada, may add a U.S. Tax Recovery Fee, and states that taxes and third-party charges may apply. The fuel surcharge you would pay on an ANA flight booked through Aeroplan was not readable on an Aeroplan page for this guide, so do not assume it matches ANA's own table. The Aeroplan partner awards guide works the fee in Canadian dollars. United MileagePlus, Alaska's Atmos Rewards and British Airways Avios can also reach flights on ANA or JAL, but those programs' own pricing pages were not read for this guide, so they are not priced here.

Booking rules that are specific to ANA and JAL awards

Several ANA rules shape how a trip is built, and they are worth reading before the dates are chosen. ANA opens award reservations at 9:00 a.m. Japan time 355 days before departure, and for a round trip the window opens 355 days before the return flight, because both directions are booked and ticketed together. Reservations close 96 hours before the first departure. Tickets are issued only when every flight on the itinerary is confirmed, and the miles must be in your ANA account at the moment of ticketing.

That last rule is the one that ties to the transfer. A waitlist is allowed for one flight on one one-way sector, up to 14 days before departure for the first segment, and ANA states that it will not tell you when a waitlist fails. Required miles, taxes and fees are recalculated at ticketing, so the total shown while waitlisted may not be the final one. Transferring points for a waitlisted seat is a bet on a seat that does not exist yet, which is the situation described in the phantom award space guide.

Routing rules are narrower than many readers expect. On a one-way ANA award a stopover is not allowed, and a round trip may include one stopover other than the destination only when it starts outside Japan, as a US-origin trip does. Within Japan, one transfer is allowed on a one-way and one on each direction of a round trip. Infants without a seat can be ticketed for 10 percent of the miles, children 2 to 11 need the adult mileage, and a passenger other than the member must be registered as an award user, with up to 10 registered and a possible request for proof of relationship.

• Changes: if a date change moves the trip into a different season and the miles required rise, the difference is taken in miles, and the change is refused if the account does not hold them. If the requirement falls, the difference is returned as miles.
• Refunds: an unused award can be refunded to the mileage account for a cancellation fee of 3,000 yen or 3,000 miles per person, requested before the first segment departs, and taxes and fees for unused awards are refunded.
• Accrual: ANA states that mileage is not accrued on award tickets, and that a delay or cancellation on an award flight does not entitle the passenger to alternate transport or accommodation from ANA.
• JAL: the chart notes that certain classes may not be available depending on the route or aircraft, and that infants sharing a seat are ticketed at 10 percent of the adult miles.

Flights inside Japan, priced on their own

Few trips to Japan stop at Tokyo, and the domestic leg is priced by different rules than the long flight. ANA's international award page allows Japan domestic connections only when ANA operates them, and the domestic segments of an international award are reserved in economy. That makes a Tokyo to Osaka or Sapporo hop an add-on to the long-haul ticket rather than a separate redemption, and the cost shows up in the long-haul price rather than as a line item.

JAL runs a separate domestic chart, last updated February 19, 2026 on the copy read, with seven zones from A for the shortest distances to G for the longest. Base prices in economy start at 4,500 miles for the shortest pairs in Zone A, and the PLUS tier raises the maximum for the same segment well beyond the base. Because a domestic cash fare can be low relative to a long-haul fare, a domestic hop is where the cents-per-point test fails most often: at 4,500 JAL miles, which is 6,000 Capital One miles, a hypothetical 15,000 yen fare of about $100 at 150 yen to the dollar gives roughly 1.67 cents per Capital One mile, while an 8,000 yen fare of about $53 would give 0.89. Those are labeled inputs, not fares; price your own segment.

A better habit than redeeming for every hop is to treat the domestic leg as a separate cash-or-points decision on the Cash or Points Calculator, leaving the transpacific award untouched. The playbooks section at the playbooks hub has other trips built the same way.

Where a Japan award goes wrong

The most expensive mistake is the order of operations. Amex says transfers are final and cannot be reversed or expedited, Capital One says there is no way to transfer miles back, and Bilt says transferred points are no longer Bilt points. A seat that disappears between the search and the ticket is therefore a loss of flexibility, not just of time, which is why the when not to transfer guide treats a confirmed price and confirmed seats as the minimum before any move.

The second mistake is comparing the wrong quantities. The ANA chart and the JAL chart describe miles in their own currencies, and a Capital One miles balance converts at 2:1.5, so a price in JAL miles has to be multiplied by 4/3 to get the Capital One miles consumed. A 27,000-mile JAL price costs 36,000 Capital One miles, and a 40,000-mile premium economy price costs 53,334, which rounds up to 54,000. The third is leaving the surcharge window out of the plan. ANA's amount is the one in effect on the ticketing date: a ticket issued on October 31, 2026 carried $352 per direction, and the same ticket issued a day later carries $419, a $134 increase on a round trip with no change in miles.

Name matching is the fourth. Capital One says the name on the account must match the name on the loyalty program, and Bilt's terms limit transfers to an account in your own name. For a family, each traveler needs a program account, or the member books for others under the award-user rules, which for ANA means registering them first. The Capital One guide and the Amex guide cover the transfer pages themselves, and the Bilt guide covers Bilt's.

What to read next

Japan awards fail most often at the seat, not at the arithmetic, so the most useful next read is the award availability checklist, which puts the airline's own search ahead of any transfer, and the chart explainer, which shows which programs publish a price before you search and which do not. If you have a date and a balance and want a verdict before you move anything, run the phantom award space checklist on the exact ANA or JAL flight, because a waitlisted or ghost seat is the one case where the correct ANA or JAL answer is to keep the points where they are.

Checklist

• Write down the bank currencies you hold and which of ANA or JAL each reaches, with the ratio.
• Find the seat on the airline's own search for your exact dates before any transfer.
• Read the ANA season or the JAL base price for your departure date, and test a date a week either side.
• Add the fuel surcharge in effect on the ticketing day, insurance, taxes and the Japanese tourist tax.
• Convert the miles to bank points at the printed ratio and round up to the issuer's increment.
• Compute cents per bank point from the cash fare minus the cash that stays, and compare with your own target.
• Check the traveler's name on the bank account against the airline account.
• Transfer only what the booking needs, then ticket the same day.